Artistic director’s statement

A lot of us right now feel a deep sense of dread as we face the state of the world—particularly the recent developments in the United States of America, a country with a rich drag culture and queer history.
Most of us have been influenced by American drag culture in one way or another, from the trailblazers of the ballroom scene to the drag superstars of RuPaul’s Drag Race.

There’s a lot I could say right now, but it would take all night, so I choose to focus on this: how the Trump administration systematically attempts to erase the “T” from LGBT.
Mentions of trans people have been wiped from all their official platforms.
Recently, in an astounding bastardization of history, trans people were even edited out of the National Park Service’s Stonewall Monument website.

The Stonewall Riots were a defining moment in queer history, sparking the modern Pride movement.
They were a reaction to police using outdated laws to arrest trans people, drag queens, and other gender-nonconforming individuals for the clothes they wore or to subject them to invasive and cruel body inspections.
You cannot erase the essential involvement of trans people in the riots—especially Black trans women like Marsha P. Johnson.
Demonizing those who live or express themselves outside the gender binary, dubbing them threats to women and children, while systematically erasing evidence of trans existence and activism, is no better than the book burnings of 1930s Germany.

We know that political discourse in the United States tends to bleed into public conversations in Norway.
A lot of us are scared—and we probably should be.
But the way forward isn’t to retreat or isolate ourselves.
It is to love ourselves and each other radically.

Norway’s drag scene has grown into something vibrant and diverse, and this festival is only a small part of that picture.
Drag is a celebration of queer joy, a means of telling queer history, and a way to build queer communities.
We create spaces to meet, exchange ideas, escape the outside world, and engage in activism.

We are cis, trans, nonbinary, lesbian, gay, bisexual—even a few straight people—with such varied expressions of gender, both within and beyond our chosen art form.
This culture is embedded in the DNA of the Pride movement, and I am proud to be a part of it.

Go see some drag. Go do some drag. Go tell your trans friends you love them.

We were always here, and we always will be.

-a speech by Artistic Director Jenny Sandmo Ellefsen, at the Oslo Drag Festival 2025 Kick-Off, February 22

Video with transcription: Luna Palmer (@whokilledlunapalmer) • Instagram-bilder og -videoer